Type of the Paper (Review)
Research of trusted real-time electrical data transmission mechanism
based on parallel proof of work algorithm
Chen Yiming, Gao Dongliang, Yang Yuxuan, Luo Jintang, Yi Li
State Grid Sichuan Economic Research
Institute, Chengdu, 610041
* Correspondence: chen90sky@163.com
Abstract: Secure and reliable electricity supply is a
prerequisite for the development of smart cities, and the trustworthy
and efficient transmission of electrical data is the foundation for the
safe and stable operation of the power grid. This paper introduces a
real-time data transmission blockchain technique based on parallel proof
of work algorithm. The new block generation progress of proposed
blockchain is divided into five subroutines: hash pointer computation,
real-time data pudding, signature value iteration, interruption, block
header assembly. The real-time data pudding and signature value
iteration are parallel processed, which brings the effect of decreasing
energy loss of blockchain system, and upgrades the speed of new block
generation and the bandwidth of data storing on blockchain. Computer
simulation shows the proposed strategy can be effectively applied in
real-time electrical data transmission application, raising the data
transmission reliability with no harm to real-time data transfer
function. This strategy provides a solution to guarantee data
transmission safety in the digital conversion of power grid.
Keywords: blockchain; electric power data; consensus algorithm;
proof of work
1. Introduction
Since 2008, when Satoshi Nakamoto invented Bitcoin, initiating the study
of blockchain, blockchain technology has been leading a new global wave
of technological and industrial transformation, becoming the ”prime
mover” of innovative social development. Blockchain technology with open
and fault-tolerant characteristics, is highly compatible with shared
economic model based on distributed systems. Meantime, blockchain
techniques can also solve the essential requirements of electric power
and energy industry. In the construction of electric power and energy
industry, blockchain as the infrastructure of digital economy combined
with industry applications, can form an immutable distributed ledger,
potentially solving management, financing, regulation, and privacy
issues caused by numerous transaction entities and opaque data
information. Extensive research and attempts have been made by
industrial experts and scholars on the application of blockchain
technology in electric power field, including distributed energy
trading[1], electric vehicle charging pile sharing[2],
enterprise energy consumption monitoring[3], carbon emission
trading[4], emerging energy business applications[5], etc. Such
researches mainly based upon Bitcoin blockchain system, establishing a
trustworthy energy trading platform through blockchain technology,
thereby reducing trust cost in traditional power trading. On the other
hand, blockchain can also be seen as a decentralized, tamper-resistant,
and open autonomous distributed database, suitable for the trustworthy
storage and transmission of enterprise data.
However, in the context of electric power production, various sampling
data need to be transmitted to dispatch control center in a timely
manner, and the real-time data transmission requirements in such
applications have limited the direct application of blockchain
technology. This paper proposes a parallel proof-of-work algorithm for
blockchain, effectively applying blockchain technology to real-time
electric power data transmission scenarios, thereby significantly
enhancing the reliability and anti-tampering ability of electric power
data transmission.
2. Blockchain Consensus Mechanism Principles
Nowadays, blockchain is commonly used for distributed storage of
transaction data. According to transactions chronological order,
different transaction data are stored in different blocks, and adjacent
blocks are linked through hash pointers. Figure 1 illustrates the
schematic diagram of blockchain data structure.